Sherry Boehlert

Mr. BOEHLERT

Mr. BOEHLERT. May I ask the Chair how much time is remaining?

Mr. BOEHLERT. Mr. Chairman, I thank the gentleman for his clarification and cooperation. I look forward to working with him and his committee and my colleagues on the Committee on Energy and Commerce on this provision, as well as other provisions of mutual interest.

Mr. BOEHLERT. I yield to the gentleman from Louisiana.

Mr. BOEHLERT. Mr. Chairman, I yield 30 seconds to the gentlewoman from Maryland (Mrs. Morella).

Mr. BOEHLERT. Mr. Chairman, I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from Connecticut (Mr. Shays).

Mr. BOEHLERT. Mr. Chairman, I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Gilchrest).

Mr. BOEHLERT. Mr. Chairman, I also yield 30 seconds to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Sawyer). (Mr. SAWYER asked and was given permission to revise and extend his remarks.)

Mr. BOEHLERT. Mr. Chairman, I rise in support of the amendment offered by the gentlewoman from California (Mrs. Bono). The amendment amends division A, which is based on text reported by the Committee on Energy and Commerce. The amendment establishes a new program within EPA and the Department of Energy regarding certain renewable and alternative energy products and technologies, and I commend her for that approach. Under the Rules of the House, the Committee on Science has jurisdiction over all energy research development and demonstration, commercial application of energy technology, and environmental research and development. Am I correct that the committee does not intend for the placement of this amendment in division A of H.R. 4 and its revision of the Energy Policy and Conservation Act to diminish or otherwise affect the jurisdiction of the Committee on Science?

Mr. BOEHLERT

Mr. BOEHLERT. Mr. Chairman, I rise in opposition to this amendment, or should I say this ruse masquerading as an amendment. I have to hand it to the proponents of drilling in ANWR. This is a very clever, well- crafted attempt to give people cover to say they oppose Arctic drilling when they do not. So let me be clear. If you oppose Arctic drilling, the vote that counts is voting ``yes'' on Markey-Johnson. That is the vote that matters substantively, and that is the vote that counts politically. This amendment is a red herring. This amendment purports to protect the environment by limiting the impact of drilling to 2,000 acres throughout the Arctic refuge. Guess what? The drilling was already going to occur on a limited number of acres. This amendment does not change a thing. The fact is, 2,000 acres is a lot of territory in an area that is now undisturbed. What is worse, the impact of drilling will be felt far beyond those 2,000 acres. The Fish and Wildlife Service estimates that 20 percent of the area will be impacted. We are talking about impacts on migratory wildlife, among other vulnerabilities. They do not tend to notice artificial, man-made boundaries. So vote against this amendment, which protects nothing. It will not protect ANWR, and it will not protect politicians looking for a way to avoid a tough vote.

Mr. BOEHLERT. Mr. Chairman, I demand a recorded vote.

Mr. BOEHLERT

Mr. BOEHLERT. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to talk about an interesting conference that will soon take place in my congressional district. On September 20 and 22, 2001, Hartwick College in Oneonta, New York, is sponsoring a symposium in honor of a truly remarkable woman: Isabel Briggs Myers. Isabel Briggs Myers devoted more than half her lifetime to the observation, study, and measurement of personality and gave us the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, the most widely used personality instrument in the world. The story of Isabel Myers and the Type Indicator is unique in the history of psychology and shows how much a single individual can achieve in the face of formidable obstacles. The story begins with Isabel's mother, Katharine Cook Briggs, a thinker, a reader, and a quiet observer who became intrigued with the similarities and differences in human personality. Katharine Cook Briggs became interested in the work of a Swiss psychologist named Carl Jung. She passed that interest on to her daughter, Isabel. Isabel Briggs, after being home schooled except for a year in public school, entered Swarthmore College at age 17 and graduated first in her class in 1919. At the end of her junior year, she married Clarence Myers. Until the outbreak of World War II, she functioned as a mother and homemaker although she found time to publish two successful mystery novels. The outbreak of World War II stirred her desire to contribute to the national effort. With the departure of much of the male workforce into the armed services and the emergence of many women new to the industrial workplace to fill their jobs, she saw a place where she could help. She was convinced that an understanding for human personality differences could help a person find a successful and rewarding kind of job and avoid unnecessary stress and conflict. Having long since absorbed her mother's admiration of Jungian typology, she determined to devise a method of making the theory of practical use. Thus was born the idea of the Type Indicator. With no formal training in psychology, with no academic sponsorship or research grants, Isabel Myers began the painstaking task of developing a set of questions that would tap the attitudes, feelings, perceptions, and behaviors of the different psychological types as she and her mother had come to understand them. A habitual reader, she haunted libraries and taught herself what she needed to know of statistics and test construction. She persuaded countless school principals in eastern Pennsylvania to allow her to test their students, and she spent many a long evening scoring questions and tabulating data. Isabel Myers Briggs spent decades working to perfect the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator. At the age of 82, she was still at work on a revised manual for the indicator, long after she was profoundly weakened by her final illness. Today, the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator has been translated into over 30 languages and is used by career counselors, colleges and universities, the Department of Defense, and numerous corporations. On September 22, 2001, Hartwick College will confer, posthumously, an honorary doctorate degree to Isabel Briggs Myers. It is well deserved. Mr. Speaker, in closing, I would like to bid the symposium attendees and Isabel's family my best wishes for the success of their event; and I applaud their desire to honor such an able scholar and true visionary: Isabel Briggs Myers.

Mr. BOEHLERT

Mr. BOEHLERT. Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. BOEHLERT. Mr. Speaker, I move to suspend the rules and pass the bill (H.R. 1858) to make improvements in mathematics and science education, and for other purposes, as amended.

Mr. BOEHLERT. Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days within which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on H.R. 1858.

Mr. BOEHLERT. I yield myself such time as I may consume. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to bring before the House today H.R. 1858, the National Mathematics and Science Partnerships Act. I want to thank the leadership for placing it on the suspension calendar. This bill belongs on the suspension calendar, which is reserved for noncontroversial items, because it is a result of a fair and deliberative process and it is designed to achieve goals we all share. Let me talk first about the process. This bill brings together ideas that originated in the President's education plan, in the version of H.R. 1858 that was introduced by me, and in the largely complementary earlier bill, H.R. 1693, that was introduced by the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Hall), the ranking member. In addition, we worked in a bipartisan fashion to include proposals by a wide variety of Members, including the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Smith), who chairs the Subcommittee on Research; the gentlewoman from Texas (Ms. Eddie Bernice Johnson), who is the ranking member on that subcommittee; and numerous other Members on both sides of the aisle. We did that by adjusting all the proposals to fit within the structure, the philosophy and expenditures already in the bill. Every time someone came up with a good idea, we did not just up the ante or go off in a different direction, we were disciplined; and we fit it all within the structure and the philosophy and expenditures in the bill. As a result, the bill was passed by voice vote at both subcommittee and full committee. Then we had further discussions with our friends on the Committee on Education and the Workforce and made additional changes in response to their concerns. We added language, for example, to ensure coordination between the National Science Foundation and the Department of Education, coordination that should occur automatically but often does not. So I want to thank the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Boehner) of the Committee on Education and the Workforce for his cooperation. As a result of that cooperation, the Committee on Education and the Workforce discharged the bill with an exchange of letters to protect each of our jurisdictions. Then we had an additional set of discussions with the Republican Study Committee and made additional changes sought by that group to ensure that we did not end up with duplicate programs within the National Science Foundation. I want to thank Neil Bradley of the RSC staff for facilitating those discussions. So the bill we are bringing to the floor reflects an open and fair process of consultation with anyone and everyone who has had an interest in this bill, and its broad support within this body reflects that. Of course, none of that process would matter if we were not doing something of significance here, and we are. This bill will allow our Nation to make major forward strides in the critically important task of improving K-12 math and science education. We have all spent a lot of time pointing to the studies that show how poorly our students do compared with their international counterparts in math and science. In this bill, we are doing something about it. The basic premise of the bill is simple. We need to do more to bring the resources and expertise of academia and business to bear on improving K-12 education. It is a simple premise, as I say; but its simplicity has not so far led to its realization. There remains a gulf between our world-class institutions of higher education and our troubled institutions of elementary and secondary education. There remains a gulf between our business community, which demands a better trained workforce, and our school systems, which educate that future workforce. There remains a gulf between our stated desire for more and better teachers, better curriculum and better educational reforms, and what we are actually investing to achieve those goals. This bill is an effort to bridge all of those gulfs. The bill authorizes a number of programs at the National Science Foundation, an agency with a long and proud history of awarding funds on a competitive, merit-reviewed basis to the best proposals that originate around the country. It authorizes programs that will encourage our colleges and universities and businesses to help school systems train teachers, develop new teaching methods, find better ways to use educational technology, apply the latest research in cognitive sciences, and prepare and gain access to better teaching materials. I want to call Members' attention to two of those programs in particular. The first is the President's math and science partnerships. President Bush deserves the gratitude of all Americans for focusing on education in general and on math and science education in particular. He made the wise decision to have the National Science Foundation run his marquee math and science initiative. We have funded this initiative at the level requested by the President, and we have structured it to ensure that colleges and universities work together with school districts without excessive interference or financial intrusion from the heavy hand of the State education bureaucracy. The second program is one close to my heart, one that I have been working on for years, the Noyce scholarships, named for Robert Noyce, an inventor of the transistor and a founder of Intel. Under this program, top math and science majors will be encouraged to teach by awarding of scholarships with a service requirement and by providing them with extra training and support. The single most important step we can take to improve math and science education is to get bright, well- trained students with confidence in their material into the classroom. This program is designed to do just that. I want to thank the gentleman from New York (Mr. Walsh) for providing appropriations to get the program started. Congress first passed a version of this program over a decade ago, and it is long past time for the National Science Foundation to get started on it. I should also point out that this bill has broad support from academic and business groups, and a bipartisan counterpart to it has recently been introduced in the other body. Mr. Speaker, in closing let me just say that this is a good bill that reflects the contributions of many Members, a bill that will make a real difference to the students and teachers in our elementary and secondary schools and, through them, a big difference to all of us. In passing this bill, we will be heeding the sound admonition of H.G. Wells: ``Civilization becomes more and more a race between education and catastrophe.'' I urge its passage. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. BOEHLERT. Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the distinguished gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Smith), the chairman of the Subcommittee on Research. He has had such an integral part to play in the development of this very significant legislation.

Mr. BOEHLERT. Mr. Speaker, I yield 4 minutes to the gentlewoman from Maryland (Mrs. Morella), who is an educator and a lawmaker and a consummate professional in both pursuits.

Mr. BOEHLERT. Mr. Speaker, I am pleased to yield 3 minutes to the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Ehlers), a distinguished scientist, distinguished educator and a distinguished lawmaker.

Mr. BOEHLERT. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself such time as I may consume. Just let me close by acknowledging how this all came about. Well- intentioned people, Republicans and Democrats alike, guided by that dedicated cadre of staff people who worked tirelessly behind the scenes to make it all possible; they crossed committee jurisdictions with the administration and the Congress, even consulting with our friends and colleagues in the other body. Sharon Hayes and Jim Wilson deserve special commendation for their endless hours of very hard and very productive work. To the parents and the students and teachers and business people in America I say, we are here to help. Mr. Speaker, this is a good bill, and I urge its adoption.

Mr. BOEHLERT

Mr. BOEHLERT. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. BOEHLERT. Mr. Speaker, this bipartisan legislation is the result of several years of hard work and perseverance on the part of my colleague, the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Ehlers). It enjoys strong support from both the business and the educational communities; and the Committee on Science approved this bill, as was mentioned, unanimously. I want to thank our good friends on the Committee on Education and the WorkForce, the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Boehner), and the ranking member, the gentleman from California (Mr. George Miller), for their advice and cooperation. We have worked together in an unparalleled spirit of close cooperation throughout this process, and they have made significant contributions to the legislation. Mr. Speaker, study after study has confirmed that certified, well- trained teachers who majored or minored in their subject matter are one of the central factors affecting student achievement. As a matter of fact, I maintain that the most important ingredient in a child's education, other than the family, is the teacher, not so much a new school or bricks and mortar or fancy textbooks or all that. They are all important, but the most important ingredient outside the home is the teacher, and this bill recognizes that. I think it is the result of a lot of hard work on the part of a lot of well-intentioned people who have put their heads together, put their talents together, and have come up with something worthy of our support. Mr. Speaker, let me salute once again the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Ehlers) for his unparalleled leadership in this effort.

Mr. BOEHLERT

Mr. BOEHLERT. I thank the gentleman for yielding me this time. Mr. Chairman, let me start with a basic proposition on which I think we can all agree. Arsenic is not very good for us. Ever since I first read ``Arsenic and Old Lace'' as a kid, I made up my mind I was going to try to avoid it as much as possible throughout the rest of my life. I am absolutely convinced that arsenic would not appear on Martha Stewart's ``It's a Good Thing'' list. That I think we can all agree with. But in my capacity as chairman of the Committee on Science, I would like to go over a little history. In 1999, the National Academy of Sciences issued a report on the safety of arsenic in drinking water. The Academy concluded that the arsenic standard for drinking water that we have had for the past 50 years was too high to ensure public safety and should come down as soon as possible. That standard was 50 parts per billion. On January 22 of this year, the previous administration issued a regulation to lower the arsenic standard to 10 parts per billion and for the new standard to go into effect by the year 2006. The fact that the regulation was issued on the last day of the previous administration in and of itself does not necessarily mean that the arsenic regulation was rushed. As a matter of fact, it has been cooking for a number of years. A number of people have been legitimately concerned about it. But regulations issued so late in any administration create at least the appearance of being rushed. That maybe is not necessarily so. But when the new administration came in, the new chief of staff Andy Card immediately issued an order: Hold everything. If I was President, I would have said to Andy Card, if you did not issue that regulation, I would have called you to task, because we want to take a good look at all these regulations. Particularly, we want to look at those that were issued in the waning days of an administration. And so the pause was ordered. I want to stress this point. Any review of regulations must be fair. It should not simply be an excuse to gut the regulation. I agree, the National Academy of Sciences was absolutely right. We have to lower the arsenic level in our water. Fifty parts per billion is hard for me to even comprehend what that really means in my everyday life as I draw a glass of water from the tap. But if the National Academy of Sciences says it is so, I believe them. We are in a time where everyone likes to say they are for science- based decision-making until the scientific consensus leads to a politically inconvenient solution, and then we look for an alternative. I like the idea that we are focusing on science. So I was very pleased when the Administrator of EPA, soon to be the Secretary of EPA, a well-deserved acknowledgment of the importance of that responsibility, when she, unlike, I must admit, a counterpart in the Department of Labor who tried to make us feel good when they rejected the ergonomics rule which I think should not have been rejected and said we are going to deal with it sometime in the future, we did not say sometime in the future, Secretary Whitman said right now, and she is doing it in a very thorough, a very methodical way. She has given us assurance that we are going to meet the same timetable as the Clinton administration wanted to meet, that is, have full compliance by the year 2006. That makes sense to me. That says no inordinate delay. She has made certain that we understand the full dimensions of the problem. We have a range of from 3 to 20 parts per billion, and the proposed regulation that will be forthcoming in a timely fashion to meet the deadline will fall within that range. It might actually be more reduction than some people have called for. The whole point of this is this: Let us do it right. Let us not decide that it is going to be 10 parts per billion only to find out after this very timely and expedited review that it really should be 7 parts per billion. Shame on us if we did that. So let us get it right the first time. I have the fullest confidence in the Secretary of the Environmental Protection Agency that she will do it right. I have the fullest confidence that we are dealing with science-based decision-making. That is the right way to go about it. I will feel a lot more comfortable when this is behind us instead of pending. I share the view of my distinguished colleagues that are advancing this proposal that we have to deal with it in a timely, constructive manner and we have to deal with it so that it gets the issue behind us in a way that we can all point to with a great deal of pride. I hope one day, when this regulation is issued, Martha Stewart will say, ``It's a good thing.''

Mr. BOEHLERT. Mr. Chairman, will the gentleman yield?

Mr. BOEHLERT. Mr. Chairman, I want to protect the life of every single New Yorker because we have been losing population. We have been redistricted, we will go down two seats, and I do not want any New Yorker to go away. But I am just as much concerned with the people of Michigan as I am with New York.

Mr. BOEHLERT

Mr. BOEHLERT. Mr. Chairman, I move to strike the last word. Mr. Chairman, I wish to identify with the remarks of my colleague who just spoke, the distinguished chairman of the Committee on Veterans' Affairs, and I wish to address the House in two capacities: one, as a friend of the veterans, as a veteran myself; and, two, in relationship to the amendment previously discussed by the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Foley). The fact of the matter is I know of no better friends for the veterans of America than the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Smith) and the gentleman from New York (Mr. Walsh). They both have very important roles to play, the gentleman from New Jersey as chairman of the Committee on Veterans' Affairs, the gentleman from New York, who is where the rubber meets the road, on the Committee on Appropriations. We can do all the authorizing in the world, but it does not mean much unless you follow up with appropriations. The gentleman from New York, to his credit, time after time has been there for the veterans, time after time has put more money in the budget to address very real problems that must be solved if we are to fulfill our commitments to the men and women who have worn the uniform of the United States military. I am very much aware of the delays in solving the claims processing crisis. Indeed it is a crisis. On several occasions I have spoken to the gentleman from New York about this. Others have, too. We have always received the same answer: ``We will be there when we are needed. Don't just judge us by our words. Judge us by our deeds.'' This budget includes $128 million, an 11 percent increase, for the Veterans Administration to address the claims processing problem. That deserves our praise and support. Now, we can always do more, but the fact of the matter is we are doing more than what is adequate to address a very real, legitimate problem. But to suggest that we take from another very sensitive area, and this is where I put on my second hat, as chairman of the Committee on Science, to suggest that we take money away from the National Science Foundation, which even Ronald Reagan, in my early years on the Hill, wanted to double funding for over a 5-year period, because he was wise then and we are wise now; and the gentleman from New York (Mr. Walsh) is evidencing the wisdom of the Congress in providing additional funds for the National Science Foundation. I do not need to remind my colleagues that we have been through a decade of unprecedented growth, quarter after quarter, year after year, growth in our economy. It is a little bit soft right now, a little bit shaky. People are concerned. I would suggest to my colleagues in the House that the way to continue to move forward, to make sure this economy keeps percolating is, one, to do what we have already done, cut taxes to get money back into the pockets of the American taxpayer, and so that they can help keep this economy humming, but secondly to invest in appropriate science, to invest in the basic research that is so essential for the continued prosperity in America. We did not get where we have been these past 10 years, quarter after quarter year after year of growth because we just wished for better things to happen. We got there because we invested in science, and science has rewarded us with unprecedented developments. The whole Internet economy, the whole telecommunications industry growth, these are things that are products of science. So I would suggest that to acquire $25 million more for something that is already being addressed in a very substantial way, $128 million more in the Walsh bill, but to get that additional $25 million by taking $92 million and, boy, talk about fuzzy math, it is tough to understand and explain in this short time how that comes about, but to take $92 million away from the National Science Foundation is just not the thing to do. We can do what we should do in a responsible way, continuing to provide more funding for the National Science Foundation and do what the gentleman from New York (Mr. Walsh) is proposing, more funding, $128 million more to solve a very real problem, that is, the backlog in the claims processing for the men and women who have served our Nation so nobly. I want to thank the gentleman from New York for his leadership. I want to thank the gentleman from New Jersey, the chairman of the Committee on Veterans' Affairs, for what he is continuing to do, to make certain everyone clearly understands that our veterans are uppermost in our minds. We have an obligation. We have a commitment. We are going to meet it.